Immigration Of-ficer IV Nirmal Bhag-gan obtained leave yesterday before Justice David Myers to apply for Judicial Review against his bosses, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of National Security and the Chief Immigration Officer. He also got the judge to put a hold on the posting abroad of Im-migration Officers Gangaram Bhaggan and Anthony Hosein, pending the hearing and determination of this matter. In his affidavit, Bhaggan stated that he was invited by his department  to indicatehis interest in serving in one of the overseas missions, and by letter dated May 9, 2002. He unequivocally indicated his interest in serving abroad as an Immigra-tion Attache. However, others, some who were junior to him, were selected and he was by-passed.

He further alleged that another branch of security  had advised his department that he had not “satisfied the eligibility criteria with regard to positive security vetting.”  Bhaggan said that he had never seen an adverse report made against him from any department. He also complained to the court that the committee which makes such recommendations did not meet, yet officers were selected. Appear-ing for him was attorney Seenath Jairam SC, leading Rishi Dass.

MINISTER of Education Hazel Manning says libraries will soon be established in all primary and secondary schools throughout the country, to help solve overcrowding and indisciplined acts carried out by students who use the Public Library in Port-of-Spain. The Ministry in collaboration with the Coca Cola Company, launched a joint initiative programme on Wednesday at the San Fernando Girls’ Primary School, in the form of remodelling the school’s library into an interactive learning centre. Minister Manning said since there was an information explosion in the country, the nation’s children ought to be provided with skills to access the information. She also said the country was bombarded by high levels of illiteracy and in order to conquer this illiteracy, all stakeholders needed to make a necessary concerted effort.

The theme of a new campaign against illiteracy is “Reading is Magic.” This concept aims to create an environment which will assist in bringing back the joy of reading to students. On Wednesday, the first of the two schools selected by the Ministry for the pilot project — the San Fernandos’ Girls’ primary school — was officially opened. The other school is Nelson Street Boys’ RC School, Port-of-Spain. General Manager of Caribbean Bottlers, Robert Ramchand said the key to the success of the programme was to demonstrate that reading is a powerful and magical skill that can help children achieve success and reach their dreams. Ramchand also urged other corporate entities to “join in” and invest both financially and otherwise in meaningful programmes, in this case, establishing libraries, in order to enable the strengthening of positive efforts. He said since the education system was a critical lifeline, it is the duty of all corporate bodies to play an important role in its development.

Trinidad and Tobago’s trade challenge is how to integrate all these negotiations in order to ensure that, “we don’t give away something in one area that will harm us in another,” according to director of the International Trade Negotiation (ITN) unit for the Port-of-Spain Chamber of Industry and Commerce, Lawrence Placide. Placide noted that there are currently too many trade negotiations taking place and the number keepsrising. He was speaking on the topic, “New Trading Alignments: Implications for the Credit Union Sector,” at the Chamber of Commerce Building, Westmoor-ings on Tuesday. Trade agreements have been increasing, said Placide, particularly over the last 12 years, and as a result, there have been numerous bi-lateral negotiations. “They have been developing free trade agreements and custom unions agreements, and like Caricom and the European Union, are moving towards common markets,” he said, noting that “these agreements generally give preferences to some of the partners over others.” 
 
He also pointed out that to date, all negotiations centered heavily on the trade of goods, particularly the WTO agreement. But with the FTAA, there has been considerable inclusions of services into the negotiations, along with intellectual property and government procurement, he said. According to Placide, there is currently a debate going on concerning the number of negotiations taking place. He added that Government may not be able to proceed as freely as it did in the past in terms of trade because of the binding commitments it is forging with other countries. “If we don’t live up to our commitments in the future, other countries will be a in position to bring sanctions against us,” said Placide. He put forth a case for the induction of the Caribbean Court of Appeal. According to Placide, the CCJ is an integral part of making trade agreements work for Caricom“Right now, there is no place for Caricom to settle trade disputes. We need the CCJ for trade protection in dealing with other Caribbean countries,” said Placide. He also noted that credit unions were not part of the FTAA negotiations currently taking place at the Hilton Trinidad. He said it was up to the unions to complete the research needed to present a case to the Government, on why they should be included in the FTAA.

Revealing that the University of the West Indies (UWI) was set to soon embark on a “a massive construction” drive to better accommodate campus students and personnel, Pro Vice Chancellor at UWI, Dr Bhoe Tewarie yesterday said they were in the midst of currently extending the Humanities Building, as a first step. The disclosure was made at a press conference held to discuss present and future plans for the campus and to highlight some aspects of the university’s strategic plan 2002 – 2007, at the office of the campus principal at UWI, St Augustine yesterday. He also revealed that construction plans entailed three phase’s, with the first and second phase earmarked for the construction of a residential complex which can easily hold about 500 students each; and phase three which will be a six-storey building housing classrooms, laboratory rooms and additional administration space for staff.

Vice Chancellor of UWI, Professor Rex Nettleford, attested to the fact that the university “was not standing still” in its quest to develop the region, and to continue making tertiary education accessible to a wider cross-section of society. Claiming that over the last five years UWI had strained its “capacity to provide more qualified young people with the opportunity to access higher education,” Nettleford quickly pointed out that despite the economic constraints encountered, the campus has been able to achieve expansion without sacrificing academic standards. Stating that this year’s record intake of the total enrolment of students for the new academic year 2003/2004 was fast approaching 30,000, as compared to previous years, he argued that “the university has been adding steadily to the pool of trained people.” He boasted that in the last eight years, UWI had produced over 27,000 new graduates with degrees, and that the annual output of first degree graduates was now about 4,000 persons per year. Adding that distance education programmes would soon be expanded to hold more persons, Nettleford said the programmes at campus currently service 3,000 students in 16 countries.

In the midst of spiralling road fatalities and crashes, Minister of Works Franklyn Khan, on Wednesday launched “Road Safe” — a creative educational approach to road safety. The launch took place  at the Chamber of Industry and Commerce in Westmoorings. The pilot programme, which is a collaborative effort between the Ministry of Works and Transport and Guardian General Limited (GGL), is targeted to pre-primary and primary school students and will be implemented on Monday thru December 2003. While officials from the Ministry will be responsible for visiting schools to conduct road safety lessons and activities, GGL will be sponsoring the learning aids and materials, such as board games, books and CDs for the project. Khan vowed: “Our aim is to develop a campaign that is not only visible but also truly impactful. It is a programme that shall not yield until the desired objective of reduced road carnage is seen as having been achieved.” He expects the pilot project to be sustained over an extended period, and as well, his Ministry to be involved in other collaborative unions which will tackle provisions and maintenance of traffic signs, reflective studs, road markings, crash barriers, lane dividers etc.

Earlier, John Gonzales, senior vice president of GGL, spoke of the impact which accidents had on productivity, the health sector and the insurance industry, noting that: “Motor accident claims cost the industry in excess of $150 million annually as there are over 25,000 reported accidents each year. This is just the cost of motor vehicle claims, exclusive of medical claim costs. Given these statistics, it stands to reason that road safety and proper road use should be the business of the insurance industry,” he declared. Gonzales also said that road safety and proper road use are issues that affect us all. It is everybody’s business.  He said he was looking forward to stemming the epidemic of road fatalities and poor driving habits on the nation’s roads. The programme is costing GGL $100,000 while they are in the process of finalising the budgetary requirements at national level.
Gonzales took the opportunity to call on other general and life insurance companies to come forward and do their part in the area of road safety. Also speaking at the launch was Richard Lawrence, marketing manager, GGL, who stated that with our population of just over 1.3 million, we are averaging over 150 road deaths annually.

He said this rate is among the highest per capita in the world. Lawrence added that statistics show that over 90 percent of accidents are due to driver error. “It seems as though once we receive our driver’s licence, we automatically forget our regulations and the Highway Code,” he said. Targetting children between the ages of three and seven in the pilot project was because these, Lawrence said, were the formative years of a child’s life, that is “when they learn right from wrong and all the values that they will carry  with them through life,” he said. The programme begins Monday at Newtown Boys’ RC, St Crispin’s Anglican, Western Boys RC, Tranquillity Government, St Monica’s and Sure Foundation. Training will be on walking on the street, crossing the street and safety in vehicles. Among those gathered at the launch were the Chief Traffic Engineer, Roger Israel, members of the  Ministry of Education and members of the Police Service.

MP for Princes Town Subhas Panday is calling on Acting Police Commissioner Everald Snaggs to provide businessmen with mugshots of persons charged with kidnapping, robberies and other related crimes. Speaking on Wednesday at a media briefing at his office on Gordon Street, San Fernando, Panday said his call came not only on behalf of the Princes Town businessmen, but businessmen and women throughout the nation. Panday said information including the full name, address and photograph of criminals should be given to the business community so as to allow proprietors to get the upperhand on all premeditated criminal activity. In so doing, businessmen may be able to prevent kidnappings and/or robberies from taking place.

Panday said although the motion he filed in Parliament last Friday on crime was not debated, he would again file another motion this week. Panday also made a call on Crime Stoppers saying they should operate in a more proactive way. He said some of the funds of Crime Stoppers should be used to hire private investigators to identify criminals’ whereabouts, especially when they are out on bail. He said since there is not sufficient police and resources to handle crime, his idea can be put on the front burner for implementation.

FIRST it was zero tolerance on illegal street vending, now San Fernando Mayor Ian Atherly is training his guns on people who construct structures in the city without permission from the relevant authorities. The Mayor said that as a result of such practices, people sometimes “redirect waters from the land indiscriminately,” which causes unnecessary flooding. He was referring to the redirecting of existing waterways such as drains and canals, by people to facilitate the building of these illegal structures, some of which are for vending purposes and others are for living purposes.

“We are not going to be putting up with this, we are going to be vigilant where this is concerned,” Mayor Atherly told Newsday yesterday. He said “Stop” notices had been served at sites found to be in breach of existing City Codes and regulations and in some cases, court action was being taken. Earlier this week, Mayor Atherly briefly visited a site at the corner of High and Penitence Streets where a box drain was being built. He said this was aimed at stopping the perennial flooding in the city, as was the case following heavy thunder showers two weeks ago. The construction of the box drain, Mayor Atherly said, may be completed by weekend. Using the box drain as an example, Mayor Atherly stated, “We have already begun correctional measures to reduce  flooding in the city.”

THE PRESBYTERIAN Church has shifted gear and jumped straight into the Caroni workers’ fray, according to the church’s official organ. “We are now compelled to speak out in the absence of a clear, distinct and well-enunciated plan by the Government on the future of sugar workers and canefarmers,” the Synod of the Church said in a statement. The Church is calling on Government to disclose its plan for the utilisation of 77,000 acres of land, formerly held by Caroni (1975) Limited. It also wants to know what will happen to the thousands of canefarmers who, the church claims, now dwell in a virtual twilight zone, especially with respect to the 2004 crop. The unresolved pension issue facing sugar workers is also of concern to the Presbyterian Church.

On the question of distribution of lands, the Presbyterians want to know the basis on which this will be done and whether mechanisms are being employed to ensure transparency and equitable distribution of the lands. In respect of canefarmers, the Church wants to know how this group will be affected by the 2004 crop, how cane would be transported from field to factory, especially in respect of north and deep south farmers and what would be the purchase price of cane. The Church hopes that financial considerations were not paramount in the closure of Caroni. “We raise this in view of a press release by the newly-formed Sugar Management Company which speaks boldly of output targets but is vague in, among other things, the number of workers to be re-employed, whether such employment will be permanent or contractual and what criteria will be used for employment.

It is noted that there isn’t a public relations department of the Government to answer many questions which have surfaced over the past months. The Church says it stands ready to assist all affected sugar workers and canefarmers in whatever way it can, to address their concerns. “Therefore, we are offering our schools and church halls as meeting places for the purpose of collectively addressing the problems faced by these workers. The Church wondered whether a financial burden was removed and replaced by a “more onerous burden. In a preamble to its statement, the Presbyterian Church made it clear that for more than a century, it established itself as a caring church in Trinidad and Tobago, imparting sound theological doctrines and embracing social responsibility in all forms. It said it became involved in the plight of sugarcane workers in the early eighties, and during their years of strike action, established feeding centres and distributed clothing and school books to affected families and children. “We have always spoken candidly and fairly and without fear on issues affecting the national community,” it added.

Foreign Affairs Minister Knowlson Gift offered support for the International Criminal Court (ICC) while addressing the United Nations Security Cou-ncil on Wednesday. He was joined by several other Ministers worldwide as they voiced support for the ICC in the wake of a move by the United States to cut aid to the ICC’s member-states. Former President of TT, ANR Robinson, was one of the early and strong advocates of  ICC. Gift, in his address, called for the strengthening of national laws to enable states to try ICC defined crimes, saying, the ICC can make a significant contribution to international peace and security by requiring that justice be administered at the national level. He said that the ICC operates on the fundamental principle of complementarily: the ob-ligation of the state to prosecute remains, and it is only where national authorities are unwilling or unable to prosecute that the court may step in.

The ICC embodies an important principle first established by the Nurem-berg Tribunal and further recognised by the Security Council through its inclusion in the statutes of the ICTY and the ICTR: no one is above the law, and no one will escape punishment for such horrendous crimes. While noting the success of those tribunals, Gift said that  the international community now has a permanent court to bring to justice the persons responsible for precisely the type of crimes for which those ad hoc tribunals were created. He said that in post-conflict situations, the capacity of national authorities to prosecute such crimes must be strengthened through appropriate forms of international assistance. “On the other hand,” he observed, “the ICC can make a significant contribution to international peace and security by requiring that justice be administered at the national level.”